Economy in Brief

The Mortgage Bankers Association reported that its Mortgage Loan Index increased 7.2% during the week of January 24 following a 1.2% dip in the prior week. Applications were two-thirds higher than one year earlier. Applications to [...]

Retail gasoline prices fell to $2.51 per gallon (+11.1% y/y) in the week ended January 27 from $2.54 per gallon in the previous week. This was the third consecutive weekly decline and the lowest price since the week ended March 11, [...]

The Conference Board's Consumer Confidence Index eased slightly in December, by 0.2% to 126.5........ The Consumer Confidence data are available in Haver's CBDB database. The total indexes appear in USECON, and the market expectations [...]

The advance reading for November indicated that durable goods orders fell 2.0% m/m (-3.7% y/y) following a 0.2% m/m rise in October, revised down from 0.6%. A 1.5% increase had been expected in the Action Economics Forecast Survey. [...]

The retail CBI survey has solid signaling power for U.K. retail sales The small table below extracts the percentile standing metrics from the large table below to feature their message. The message is clearly that current retailing [...]

The Conference Board's Consumer Confidence Index rose a solid 3.4 points (2.7% m/m, 8.1% y/y) to 131.6 (1985=100) in January from an upwardly revised 128.2 in December (initially reported as 126.5). The Action Economics Forecast [...]

• Headline durable goods orders jumped 2.4% in December, failing to make up for the downwardly-revised 3.1% drop in November. • Transportation orders account for the volatility. Excluding transport, orders edged down 0.1%. • Core [...]

• Headline durable goods orders jumped 2.4% in December, failing to make up for the downwardly-revised 3.1% drop in November. • Transportation orders account for the volatility. Excluding transport, orders edged down 0.1%. • Core [...]